Saturday 3 October and 14 November 2015, 9am - 3pm

Oliver Carter

Lecturer in Media and Cultural Theory

Areas of Expertise

Fan Production

Media Education

Paracinema: particularly European Cult Cinema

Porn Cultures

Biography

Oliver Carter is a lecturer in media and cultural theory and also a member of the Centre for Media and Cultural Research at the Birmingham School of Media at Birmingham City University. He is both a fan and researcher of Euro-Cult cinema, having recently completed his doctoral thesis: Making European cult cinema: fan production in an alternative economy. He is the convenor of the modules Creativity in the Media, Media Culture and Popular Culture. He is also a contributing author to the book Media Studies: Text, Production and Consumption (Pearson Education).

Social Media/Websites

Research

In addition to his doctoral thesis, which focused on the cultural and economic processes of European cult cinema fan production, Oliver Carter's recent work has included research into fantrepreneurship, online file-sharing communities, fan filmmaking, the British hardcore pornography industry, radio documentary and media education. In collaboration with research centre member Dr Simon Barber, Oliver Carter is also developing the Video Cultures research project, which investigates different aspects of cult film consumption.

Postgraduate Supervision

Oliver Carter supervises doctoral students primarily in the area of fandom and cult media. He is both a fan and researcher of European cult cinema, his doctoral thesis: Making European cult cinema: fan production in an alternative economy, focusing on how fans culturally and economoically produce fandoms. He has recently published work on online file-sharing communities, Italian cult cinema, fan film production and radio documentary production. He is currently pursuing research into cult film preservation and distribution, looking at the role fans play as archvists of cult film and how cult film labels approach releasing film in the digital age. Oliver is also beginning work that intends to historicise the British hardcore pornography film industry and how it was culturally and economically produced.

Oliver is keen to attract students who wish to work on projects related to cult film fandom, fan production and fan enterprise, digital piracy, online file-sharing communities, porn studies and cult film preservation.

'Student to Scholar: Developing Vital Academic Skills on the Journey from Further Education Through Higher Education', Media Education Summit, Birmingham City University, 7-8 September 2010.

'Sound and Vision', Radio Documentary, Fandom and New Participatory Cultures, [co-presented with Sam Coley], Sights and Sounds: Interrogating the Music Documentary Conference, University of Salford, 3-4 June 2010.

'Critical Autonomy and Applied Theory in Media Education: Addressing the Problem of Student Transition', [co-presented with Faye Davies], MeCCSA/AMPE Annual Conference, London School of Economics, 7-9 January 2010.